Response to Grace

Isaiah 26: 10-11
Let grace be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he will deal unjustly, and will not behold the majesty of the LORD.
LORD, when Your hand is lifted up, they will not see. But they will see and be ashamed for their envy of people; yes, the fire of Your enemies shall devour them.

You know that kid in school, who you constantly try to show grace to and love? Then after he does something stupid and jerky to you, you wonder why you showed the love and grace, and want to stop bothering with it, but you know you can’t.

God knows this happens. Grace is shown to the wicked, but they might not respond with righteousness. Actually, they probably won't. Wicked, of-the-world people are not righteous, therefore they can’t respond with righteousness. (We’re only righteous through the blood of Christ).

Even surrounded with righteousness, they deal unjustly. They won’t pay attention to God’s majesty. Isn’t that frustrating, when you can see how much God loves them, and they just can’t or won’t see Him moving in their life?

But the unrighteous are often envious people. They are jealous of the good things that others have.
So if God is a good thing to have, it would make sense that they are jealous of our relationship with Him, and all the trust it comes with.

But here’s the thing: they won’t admit it, and sometimes they don’t even know. So we can’t be all ‘you’re so jealous of me!’ because a) that’s a little unloving and prideful and b) they won’t get it.

We just have to remember that we were made to worship God. Everyone longs for a relationship with God, even if they don’t know it. Sometimes they don’t know how to express that longing, but God knows that they have it. That’s why we have to show them grace, because they want a relationship with some sort of god, and we have a great God to show them. But the only way others know who He is and what He’s like is when they look at us and see how we act.

In His Service,
Joyce